Been a very long time since I wrote my last Conan fic. And to be fair, as much as I would want to rewrite that old piece, I might as well move on and write anew.

Part of the plot on this chapter was kinda influenced by an old fic muse that I post here. So I'm reviving that old muse in a much different setting.

Chapter 1: Unexpected situation

He could barely muster a choked laugh, considering the unbelievable situation right now. What kind of a convoluted twist of fate, to have something like this happening to him at such timing? Even if it was for some twisted novel narrative for some fantastic mysterious tale, he would've thought any writer that could think up such a twist to be out of their minds!

Yet, could this turn of events be bad for him. Or advantageous?

He bit his lips as he stared up towards the youth before him.

"You—! You don't seem to be surprised. Why—since when did you know about this?"

The youth just shrugged to himself, saying nothing yet telling him enough that the youth had been aware of his identity (or at least suspecting it) for quite some time. That explained it. It really made a lot more sense now! The reason why lately the youth kept being bolder and bolder in using his identity to use in their many heists, especially if he happened to be around as well.

It was not just because using Kudou Shinichi's identity proved to be quite advantageous to the youth whenever the youth was not able to use his disguising ability in his operations. It was also because the youth was aware that even if he's around to prove that the youth was NOT the real Shinichi, in his position he couldn't risk revealing that fact without endangering himself and the people around him. (And it's not like he could conveniently appear as himself to bust Kid's bubble anyway.)

He should have realized this much sooner. That this guy had been aware of his true identity for a while. He should've noticed it, the moment the youth had stopped referring to him as just a (young) detective and calling him often as the 'famed' detective.

But then again, with his current identity often being lauded as KID Killer by the masses... it would've been pretty easy to overlook such hints. And perhaps, because he had gotten too comfortable with having some of the members of the police, the FBI, NPA and even the Detective Boys seeing him using his normal deductive abilities that were not like a normal child's... to the point that he'd drop his guard and forgot about maintaining the child mask.

There must have been a point when his deductions might've let slip some critical information to the youth, leading the youth to be able to figure him out. And of course, the youth would've used it to his advantage.

How stupid of him to not realize this sooner!

"Heh! And I thought you'd at least be grateful to me for saving your ass just now."

Hmph! As if!

It was by chance... that he happened to be around as he saw that famed 'High School Detective of the East', seemingly in some kind of trouble. Well, partially. Aside from the fact that he had been trying to scout out the location for his next target, there was that warning that Akako gave him this morning. Well, he's not the kind to really fell for any kinds of superstitions but in case of Akako, well that's another story.

But he really hadn't expected to see the detective around, especially in his original body. Well, there were those words of mouths... rumours that he occasionally heard about the so-called 'Heisei Holmes'. Of the guy to be said to have appeared somewhere during some select cases, in which later on whenever media picked those pieces of rumours out... there would be some other claims that would squash those rumours. Calling those appearances of Kudou Shinichi as just some doppelgangers and lookalikes.

Well, not that he really cared a lot about that dude anyway but after that one time when they had indirectly clashed, he couldn't help taking an interest anyway. And that Kudo was slightly less annoying than Hakuba and both of them were NOT from the same school (which was a plus). Anyway, he learned that at some point... THAT Kudou had started to shy away from the limelight. In which he SHOULD have felt relieved about. Less one (high school) detective to foil Kaitou Kid's heists.

But then later on... that kid appeared in his life. Or more like, that kid started to cross paths with Kaitou Kid.

And he started noticing it after a while. How that kid's presence had that familiar feeling. How he started to dread as well as look forward to their next clashes. And he was aware of that feeling well. That as much as Edogawa Conan—Kudou Shinichi—should be his mortal enemy, that guy's also like a fond friend. Someone who... he'd want to impress with the many magic tricks that he could think up.

To be fair, he used to consider Edogawa Conan-kun and Kudou Shinichi to be different people. But many things happened in the course of their acquaintances... and well, he kept finding little hints that often tried to tell him that the two might be the same person. As much as that idea would have sounded so weird.

But considering he was going after a criminal organization who seemed to believe that there's a special big gem that could be a key to achieving immortality... as well as learning that one of your fellow schoolmates was an actual red witch, finding out that there's a possibility of some kind of drug that could change a person's body into a child's doesn't sound as weird anymore.

Well, seeing really DO mean believing. Because even as he was aware that Kudou's situation could be like that, it's another thing to ACTUALLY see his body shrinking in front of your eyes. He barely managed to NOT let his poker face fall from his countenance. It was lucky as well that he decided to drag Kudou away the moment he started seeing visible steam starting to come out from the guy's body.

The small kid continued to glare at him as Kaito starting to draw amusement from the sight. He held out his hand towards the kid.

"Come on... let's get you someplace better than here."

The small guy still behaved stubbornly, before Kaito decided to just sweep the 'kid' off the ground anyway and leave their hiding place.

A/N: Well, I call this a 'short' but it's more of a snippet of scenes that I wanted to write. Anyway, basing this on manga only and not counting the non-canon movies. Yet even then, based on just this in some of the recent KID chapter I always did feel that Kuroba already knew about Shinichi's secret. As to how, it's up to anyone's guesses. But it always felt to me that at times, whenever Kaito thought about Conan or talked to him as of late... it's like he's treating him as Shinichi. Like in that special on Ryoma, Kaito didn't really seem THAT surprised when Shinichi casually talked about Yukiko acting as Ryoma's sister. As if he's already aware that Conan/Shinichi's mum was an actress and WHO she was. XP

That said, trying a slight variant of the usual formatting style on my fics.